Soil remediation techniques have become increasingly important due to deterioration of soil environments, especially in the regions and places where development activities are taking place. Depending on the nature of contaminated soil, an appropriate technique may be used. For example, an electrolysis reduction method may be used for remediation of heavy metal-contaminated soil. In an electrolysis reduction method, contaminated soil is slurried with an electrolysis solution (e.g., hydrochloric acid), and then a voltage is applied to electrodes arranged in the resulting slurry whereby a heavy metal (e.g., lead) is deposited on and collected from one of the electrodes.
Such a soil remediation technique using the electrolysis reduction method, however, cannot be used for soil contaminated by volatile organic materials such as halogenated compounds. Accordingly, remediation of hazardous organics-contaminated soil may need a technique of, for example, heating contaminated soil at a high temperature, or alternatively causing chemical reactions of the hazardous organics, to decompose the hazardous organic compounds into harmless compounds.
Accordingly, a soil remediation technique capable of recycling or reusing the volatile organic compounds extracted from the contaminated soil would prove to be widely useful.